


Come What May

by Cowboy_Sneep_Dip



Category: Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: Blood and Injury, Doomed Timeline(s) (Fire Emblem: Awakening), F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, Post-Battle, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-26
Updated: 2019-06-26
Packaged: 2020-05-20 00:55:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19366981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cowboy_Sneep_Dip/pseuds/Cowboy_Sneep_Dip
Summary: “How about I go lay down and you can take care of me? Is that fair?”“You’re still an idiot,” Severa pouts, slipping her fingers into Lucina’s and squeezing.





	Come What May

**Author's Note:**

> A commission for @dorkling! Thanks so much for giving me an excuse to cry about my favorite girls. Hope you enjoy!

The sun hangs low in the sky, a horizon of red bleeding through the trees and pouring in shades of orange and ripples of yellow across the battlefield, cutting through the haze of smoke and still-burning fires. The treelines are cast in shadow, tangled skeleton branches like ashy fingers clutching towards the red sky, and purple clouds billow lit in halos of iridescent yellow. 

Lucina coughs blood into her glove and wipes it on the bottom of her tunic. 

Falchion is heavy in her hand, glinting silver in the sunset, and she drags it across the mud with weary resignation. She had lost the sheath, somewhere. A Risen axe had raked across her belt, sending her sheath and gear pouches scattering into the mud. She coughs again and presses a cautious, exploratory finger against her ribcage. Pain sparks across her chest and she winces. 

She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath before continuing, Her boot landed on a scrap of tattered and bloody fabric. A hand reached from the mud, grasping out, motionless. She bites her lip and braces herself against Falchion like a crutch. She’s fortunate it’s so big and never dulls. She traces a divot in the mud behind her. 

The battle had gone poorly. No, poorly was an understatement. They had lost, that was the long and short of it. Of course they did.

No one won, not anymore. Not since Ferox fell, not since Ylisstol burned to ash and the land turned sour. There wasn’t winning. There was survival, and Lucina survived.

She coughs again and peels her glove from her hand to wring the brown sludge of blood and dirt from it. Her palm is bleeding - the pad of the glove had been burned away when she yanked a burning cloak from a soldier on the wrong end of an Elfire tome.

“Ma’am?” a voice calls out. 

She looks up, startled to hear.

“Glad to see that you survived, milady,” says a knight whose name Lucina can’t remember. She knew him - he had two children back home. She presses a hand to her side to hide her torn tunic and dented mail and forces a smile.

“Of course. It would take more than an ambush to kill me.”

The soldier laughs. “Of course, milady.”

Lucina tastes copper and holds it between her teeth, not letting it run down her lips. “Are you on cleanup?”

“Aye,” the man nods. “Ser Brady is setting up an emergency medical tent and sending the men who can walk out to drag back survivors.”

Lucina nods. “Carry on, then.” 

The man offers a curt, polite bow and carries on as ordered.

As soon as Lucina thinks it safe, she clutches her stomach and lurches blood into the mud. She isn’t sure what part of her is wounded - that’s for her to take stock of in private, in the shadows of her tent. There were others who needed the vulneraries and staves more than she. 

Her heart lifts when she sees the flicker of flame in the trees - the torches around camp, illuminating the circle of carts and tents, the bonfires and horses and soldiers that survived.

A shadow passes her. “Milady, I hate to trouble you, but could you assist us?”

Lucina turns to see two men - no, a man and a boy no older than ten, at Lucina’s guess, carrying a body. 

Lucina purses her lips and nods hastily, preferring it to speech. She helps the child support the body, a woman with brown hair and blood pooling around the divot of her stomach. “Hold this,” she says, giving Falchion to the boy and taking his burden.

The woman blinks up at her.

“Shh,” Lucina says softly, holding her shoulders. “Don’t speak.”

“Milady,” the soldier smiles, closing her eyes. 

She’s heavy, practically dead weight, but Lucina holds her carefully, trying not to put pressure against her. 

“The men are glad to see you helping, milady,” the boy says in a low, soft tone. “They say we lost the battle, but you still survive.”

Lucina grits her teeth and nods.

“Why don’t you take the princess’ sword to her squire,” the man says, and the boy nods and shuffles off, proud to have a mission. 

“Thank you,” the man says quietly. 

They carry the wounded woman to the infirmary pavilion, a canvas roof over makeshift stretches and bedrolls. Brady is there, wiping his brow and issuing orders, pointing with bloodied gloves. 

“Heya, Luce!” he smiles, seeing her approach. His smile melts as he sees her cargo. “There’re spare bedrolls out back,” he points a thumb over his shoulder. “Cynthia is managing the overflow.”

Lucina nods. 

They gingerly deposit the woman in a bedroll and the man sets to tending to her. Lucina stands, offers a curt nod, and ducks behind the medical pavilion. Pain bites at her shoulders. The strain was too much to carry a whole human being, she knew that. She rests her forehead against a tree and tries not to upend her lunch rations into the dead underbrush. 

The sun sets behind the trees, casting long shadows through the tangled deadwood, and Lucina slumps backwards, resting, one hand against her side. She stares at the trail of blood she had left, bootprints muddied in red. 

“H-hey,” she stammers out at the shadow following her trail.

“You IDIOT!” Severa screeches, stomping towards her. “You moron, you ingrate, you stupid BASTARD!” Severa grabs Lucina’s shoulder and tugs her forward, pressing her lips against Lucina’s, cracked and bloody.

Lucina coughs and pushes her off. “Hey, Sev,” she smiles. She glances at her own tunic and smiles again. “Sorry, got caught in a bit of a bad spot.”

Severa shakes her head, indignant and bubbling with anger. “Do you know how WORRIED I’ve been?!” Only restraint and Lucina’s blood prevents her from lashing her hand out and slapping Lucina, probably. Even an Exalt isn’t above getting chewed out by her fiance.

Lucina smiles sheepishly and coughs. “I’m okay,” she says again, standing up straighter. “I just need to lie down for a bi-” she slips, almost collapsing until Severa catches her.

“You idiot,” Severa says again, blinking back tears. “I thought you had-”

“Well, I hadn’t,” Lucina smiles from her position in Severa’s arms. “I’m okay, I promise.” 

Severa shakes her head and Lucina can tell her hands are trembling. She pushes herself lightly out of Severa’s grip and slings her arm over Severa’s shoulder. “How about I go lay down and you can take care of me? Is that fair?”

“You’re still an idiot,” Severa pouts, slipping her fingers into Lucina’s and squeezing. It still hurts, but it’s a good hurt, like a cold splash of water after a nightmare. 

Severa slides her arm around the small of Lucina’s back and Lucina drapes herself heavily over her. Severa helps her limp back through camp to their tent. It’s a small, cramped space located at the center of camp, much to Lucina’s chagrin. She had wanted a spot at the rim, to be first up in case of danger, but Severa had insisted. Everyone had insisted she stay protected.

Severa unfastens the front flaps of the tent and carries Lucina into the cool darkness inside. There’s a small folding wooden table set up to one side, with a lantern burning soft yellow in the dark, casting flickering shadows over the bedrolls laid out on the ground. Falchion is in one corner, muddied and stained red, propped up against the tent’s corner. 

Severa rests Lucina on a bedroll and props her up against a pillow. “Do you need help undressing?”

Lucina grimaces and pulls a sticky hand away from her side. She nods.

Severa nods, too, and reaches to unclasp the buckle of Lucina’s cloak. She bunches up the fabric and piles it in a corner. “Are you okay? I’m going to get some supplies.”

Lucina nods and waves her off, just relieved to be off her feet. She closes her eyes and rests back against the pillow, focusing her energy on breathing. After a few minutes, Severa returns with a jug of water, dry cloths, bandages, some medicine in jars, and vulneraries.

Lucina shakes her head and winces. “No vulneraries. Others need them more.”

“It’s just for an emergency,” Severa relents, setting her supplies on the short table. “Because we don’t know the extent of your wounds.”

She can’t pull Lucina’s tunic off, so she presses a short knife to the back and slices it through the fabric. She finds the source of the trouble - a place where Lucina’s mail is mangled and crusted with dried blood, the tunic tangled up in the metal. She cuts around it and rips the fabric.

“W-watch it,” Lucina winces. 

“Sorry,” Severa says quietly. She finishes cutting off Lucina’s tunic, leaving her in just her mail and undershirt. It’s a mess of dented metal, some of it tinged black, most turned brown with mud or crusted blood. Severa winces, tugging it away, sticky and heavy. There’s a hole in one side, jagged ends of shattered and bloody jumprings . Lucina groans as Severa pulls it away from her skin.

“Sorry,” Severa says again. She nudges Lucina’s arms up. “I can’t cut this off, so I’m going to have to pull it up, okay?”

Lucina shakes her head and grimaces. “I...I can’t lift my arm, I don’t think.” She pulls a hand away from her side and blood runs in rivulets between the mail rings. Severa frowns. “Okay.”

She rests Lucina back against the pillows again, watching the red stain the offwhite beneath her. She looks pale, pale enough that Severa is nervous. 

“I’m going to take your boots off, okay?”

Lucina nods.

Her boots are muddy and sticky, and it takes effort for Severa to pry them off. Underneath, her leggings are stained with dark red from a wound on her thigh, a deep cut that runs down her leg. “Lucina, I need to stop the bleeding.” Severa sits up and snatches medicine from the table. 

“Here, hold this.”

Lucina swallows and nods, taking a roll of cloth from Severa’s hands. Severa tears Lucina’s leggings with a single rough stroke before pouring water down her leg and wiping it down with a cloth. It’s clear, for a second, and Lucina’s heart lurches at the sight of the wound, and then blood against skin again. Severa pours a vulnerary over it and with a hiss of steam and the sting of flesh, the wound closes. 

“You okay?” 

Lucina nods, her motions jerky and frantic. Her breath comes in shuddering gasps. 

“Lucina…” Severa slips her hand into Lucina’s. She feels cold and the blood makes her hand slippery. “It’s going to be okay. I promise.”

“I...know,” Lucina hisses through clenched teeth. “I’ve got you taking care of me.”

Severa smiles weakly and sits up. She finishes cleaning and wrapping the wounds on Lucina’s legs. Other than the gash on her thigh, the rest neaten up easily - a soothing ointment and bandages over an angry red burn, adhesive bandages over smaller cuts. Severa scrubs her legs down with a cloth, working diligently to clean the mud and blood before dressing her wounds. 

She wrings out the cloth into a bucket that turns a frothy, muddled brown. 

Lucina’s breathing is sharper now, her chest rattling.

“Try to breathe,” Severa says quietly. “You’re going into shock.”

Lucina nods. Severa pours some of her jug of water into a wooden bowl and and holds it up to Lucina’s lips, tilting her head back. “Just drink, okay?”

Lucina’s trembling lips dribble water down her chin, mixing with blood and spit. Severa wipes her mouth and sets the bowl down. 

“I’m going to try to take your mail off. It’s going to hurt, but I need to.” She reaches out and squeezes Lucina’s hand. “Okay?”

Lucina nods, blinking her half-lidded eyes. 

It hurts, just as Severa advertises. It feels like her shoulders crack as the mail passes over her - they don’t, but it  _ feels _ that way, between the twisted metal scraping at her and the compression against her skin. Severa discards the mail into a pile of tarnished steel and turns her attention to Lucina. 

“You’re bleeding,” she says quietly, more for herself than for Lucina. She holds her cloth to Lucina’s forehead and wipes blood from her fringe. “Hold your hand here and I’ll dress your head first.” 

Lucina does as instructed, pressing her palm against the wound in her side. It was a lance, she recalls, one that scraped by at just the right angle to rend through her tunic and snag on her mail. It had sent her sprawling from her horse and into the mud. 

She hisses as Severa presses a cold cloth to her forehead, wiping blood before wrapping her head with bandages. She tucks gauze underneath a strip and presses it to Lucina’s eye. “Is it too tight?” 

Lucina’s lips move but Severa can’t hear her. She presses her own lips to Lucina’s forehead, softly. “Just rest. Sleep if you need to, I’m almost done.”

Lucina’s lips move again. 

Severa peels Lucina’s sweat-sticky undershirt from her chest and wipes down her abdomen, scrubbing blood and sweat from her skin. 

Lucina stares at her through one half-lidded eye, the other shrouded in darkness. It doesn’t sting anymore where Severa pours medicine on her, it doesn’t hurt when Severa wraps her chest with bandages. She isn’t sure where exactly she is, or what’s happening, but seeing Severa work is pleasant enough. That little furrow of her brow when she’s focusing, the way her bangs bob when she bows her head. Her soft lips, mouthing gentle encouragement to herself.

Lucina tries smiling, but she isn’t sure if it takes. Things don’t hurt, not with her here. Or maybe they do, and it doesn’t matter. She watches Severa wrap bandages around her palm and her world slips away into darkness.

 

-

 

Lucina wakes, gasping for breath. She claws at her face, fingers trying to catch the wrappings around her face, the gauze against one eye. 

“Shh!” Severa sits up and grasps her arm, holding her down. “Shh, it’s okay. It’s okay. It’s okay.” She rocks Lucina gently and presses lips to her forehead, waiting for her harsh, staggered breaths to slow. 

“I...I...wh…” Lucina stumbles her words past dry, cracked lips. 

“It’s okay,” Severa says again, catching her head and pressing her to the crook of her neck. “You’re safe. You’re safe.”

Lucina nods weakly and closes her eye. 

“I’m here,” Severa says quietly, kissing Lucina’s brow, her cheek, daring a probing exploration of her lips. Lucina can’t kiss her back, but she opens her mouth slightly, welcoming the soft warmth. 

It’s dark inside the tent. The lantern has been extinguished, and Lucina can’t see anything but vague shapes: Severa’s outline against the canvas walls, the table in the corner, a pile of tatters off to one side. She shivers. 

“Sorry,” Severa wraps a blanket around Lucina’s bare shoulders. “Your clothes probably won’t make it,” she laughs quietly. 

It’s warm, under the covers, pressed against the warmth of Severa’s body. She can feel bandages wrapped around her skin - her legs are a mess of them, practically a full pair of leggings in gauze and adhesive, and her chest and left arm are both wrapped tight. She still has enough bare skin to feel Severa’s, though, the warmth of her body as they huddle together under the blanket. Lucina leans back against the pillows Severa had arranged behind her and closes her eyes. 

“Don’t try to speak,” Severa says quietly, kissing her bare shoulder before tugging the blanket back up to cover her. “I’m here.”

Lucina curls against her, her trembling body stilled by the comfort of another presence. Severa’s hand wraps Lucina’s and she can feel the cool metal of the ring on her finger. A promise. 

“We didn’t lose as many as we thought,” Severa mutters sleepily. “Brady really kicked our asses to recover the wounded and we managed to save most of them.”

Lucina hums. 

“You’re okay, Lucina.” Severa kisses her again, on the lips this time.

And this time, Lucina believes it. 


End file.
